John O'donnell

341

Maureen Withey on 27th January 2025

Some particulars of a very extraordinary and very distressing circumstance have lately reached us, and which have, for some weeks back, somewhat singularly escaped publicity. Fertile present, however, we shall merely advert generally to the statement we have heard, reserving for a future occasion a more detailed narrative. Some time about the period of the celebrated mutiny and outrage at Castle Forbes, a man named O'Donnell, also in the service of Messrs Mudie and Larnach, absconded from their farm, and remained an absentee up to within about three weeks ago, when he was apprehended and brought into Maitland. It is not known that this man committed any crime during the time he was in the bush; and, therefore, the motive for the desperate act which he committed after he was apprehended can only be guessed at. Can it be true that when taken, he exclaimed, " Poor O'Donnell ! its all over with you now," or words to that effect and that he declared he had absconded solely on account of the ill-treatment he had met with from his masters? It is true that shortly after he was placed in confinement, he cut his throat with a razor, though not so effectually as to deprive him of life for some hours after; but is it true that while in extremis, he made and attested a declaration before the police magistrate, and the clergyman by whom he was attended, to the same effect as what he had previously stated, but more in detail ? Is it true also, that at the inquest which was subsequently held on the body, evidence of these facts was given, and that the jury expressed to the coroner their desire that a statement to the same effect might be forwarded to the Governor, which the coroner then refused to do, and which we have reason to believe he has not yet done ? Why he has not done so, no doubt he can explain ; but as we have now brought the subject under the notice of the Governor, we suppose His Excellency will not fail to enquire why the request made by the jury was not attended to, and will also call for a statement of every thing that transpired in the course of the investigation in this case. Under ordinary circumstances, we would be disposed to pay little attention to the mere assertions of a man in the situation of O'Donnell when he was apprehended as a bushranger ; but when we connect the facts of his case, and his tragical end by his own hand, with other facts which had previously taken place, we think that the matter is deserving of serious notice. An outrage committed by some desperate convicts at Castle Forbes has been made a pretext for assailing the present Governor, by means of newspapers," Vindications," and " hole and corner" petitions, through all of which channels His Excellency has been impeached before the Secretary of State, for attending to, and enquiring into, the statements of convicts with respect to their treatment by their masters. His Excellency has also had it not very indirectly imputed to him that he was actuated by some particular pique against Messrs. Mudie and Larnack, whose servants, whatever they might have asserted to the contrary, it was insisted were as well treated as any others in the colony. Some of them, however, were most deservedly executed for a daring crime ; but to the last they protested that ill usage in various ways drove them to the commission of that crime. Far be ss from us to assert that those wretched and Daily P«fi stated nothing untruly { but we have the fact before I us, that at the end of eighteen months another man who absconded about the same time, and from the same masters, as the men who have paid the forfeit of their lives for their crimes, committed suicide after he was apprehended, and, in his dying moments, protested, as they did, that he fled from his service in consequence of ill-usage. Yet into matters such as this, the " hole and corner" petitioners and their abettors deny the Governor's right to enquire ! It is far from our wish to renew angry discussion, but we do say that the circumstances of the man, O'Donnell, having absconded from the service of Messrs. Mudie and Larnach, the manner of his death, and the statement made by him just before he died - taken in connexion with former statements respecting the treatment of assigned prisoners at Castle Forbes fully warrant the Governor in calling for the declaration made before the police magistrate at Maitland, and a full report of all which transpired at the inquest. Sydney Gazette, 14 Feb 1835. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 1835. We have been furnished with some further particulars respecting the death of John O'Donnell, an assigned servant to Mr. Mudie of Castle Forbes, whose case we recently alluded to. One part of the statement then made by us was, we find, erroneous we mean as to the length of time, the unfortunate man had been an absentee. It seems that he had been in the bush hut three weeks only, and had committed no other offence and his sentence of transportation was seven years, four of which he had served. The razor with which he committed the rash act fell from the hat of the man who had him in custody; and so effectually did he inflict the wound that he divided the passages to the lungs and stomach completely, and, strange to say, without wounding any of the large arteries of the neck. During the time he lingered, sustenance was conveyed to the stomach through a tube, by Surgeon M Allen who, as well as the Rev. Mr. Rusden, was assidious in his attention to the deceased. To the last, he protested that dread of punishment for running away was not the feeling which prompted him to commit self-destruction. Our informant adds that he died penitent. Sydney Gazette, 24 Feb 1835.

341

Maureen Withey on 26th January 2025

Irish Convict Database, by Peter Mayberry. John O’Donnell, alias Mullaly, age on arrival, 26, per Dunvegan Castle (2), 1832. Tried 1832 at Kildare, 7 years for Bigamy. DOB, 1806, native place, Armagh Co. Married. Catholic. Trade, Carter. Died 1835 at Maitland. Suicide by cutting throat.